Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for granting me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

3.5 - 4 stars. I didn't love everything about this... about 75% of the way through I felt like I lost the thread and didn't really get back to it until closer to the end. However I'm glad I stuck it out as I suspected at some point this confusion was intentional. H. E. Edgmon is making the reader feel as disoriented and confused about who is who (as each character has multiple names, memories, and recognition of themselves) in such a way as it is the closest I (as a bisexual woman) may ever come to having even an iota of understanding what it might be like to be confused about gender and sexuality as a teen (my own understanding of being bisexual was helped along by some key late 90's, early LGBTQ+ Internet pages) .

I'm looking forward to recommending this to my trans cousin and seeing what she thinks. I am confident she will want to read it when I tell her it's complex like Gideon the Ninth (Tamsyn Muir), as godly as Banewrecker (Jacqueline Carey), and as teenage romantic as Aristotle and Dante (Benjamin Alire Sáenz). It also features realistic physical moments between a trans character and their partner; such as running fingers over top surgery scars. I shivered a little at this at felt so genuine and definitely very intimate.

All that said... there are three important things to know, in my opinion, going into Godly Heathens:
1) The ending is abrupt and a cliffhanger. I was lucky to have book 2, Merciless Saviors at my fingertips to start immediately. You are likely to want to do the same. It is about one minute between the end of the first book and the opening line of book 2. I greatly dislike this, as it gives no reminder of the story if there has been some time between books (it's also just rude to readers to give no real ending at all...). I'm also not a fan of reading books one after another for fear of getting tired of characters or the story. That said, her I am making the exception for the first time in years.

2) There are a lot of characters with different names, abilities, memories, and situations. It's a lot to keep track of. I did not realize, until near the end, that there is a cast of the god characters at the back of the print book. However it should be noted that the list has spoilers for events in this first book.
One thing that does help a lot with this issue, and perhaps saved me at times, was listening to some chapters on audio. The narrator does a brilliant job of defining the characters and being consistent with the voices of each. In the end it helped me keep things together enough to keep going and not feel like I needed to reread/listen to sections, or just give up on the whole story. I did swap between audio and print a few times, and I'm glad I did. This gave me time to absorb some of the story in my head in print; but the audio helped define the different characters when I was lost. Kudos to the narrator for keeping the voices consistent and distinct (without being silly or obnoxious).

3) Morality and love are brilliantly put in opposition of one another in Godly Heathens. Edgmon takes us on a crazy journey and confuses us as much as the leading POV character is. It is brilliant; and it is frustrating. At times I wanted to yell at our non-binary lead to tell them to just do something!! Yet I also understood why they didn't (generally because of their heart being in the way). At the end of the day I love Edgmon's continuing message: "Surviving does not make us evil".

And now I am doing something I almost never ever do... I am heading into book 2 immediately. As I went to listen to the first chapter or two; and now I'm sucked in. (Insert a maniacal winning laugh here from Edgmon and the publisher that I'm caught in their web, lol.) So I suppose they win this round as I break my usual rule of waiting a book or two before heading into the next in a series.

Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an honest and unbiased review.

Hello good morning this is a book that was made for me!

"When small town Georgia's resident indigenous non-binary slut discovers the intense dreams they've always had means so much more..."

This is the sort of book I wished I had as middle/high schooler who spent the majority of my displaced not fitting in time wishing there was so much more than extremely boring classes (note: this was depression and moving 2,000+ miles in the middle of 7th grade) and friends who didn't respect me, the pre-Harry Potter days of the late 1990s/early 2000s where I had already graduated from RL Stine and Christopher Pike long ago to move onto Anne Rice and Stephen King...

Enough about my own past! Godly Heathens is about some teens in the rural south who find out/know/are forced to know that they are also gods reincarnated from a world parallel to our own-- but hand in hand with this, they are still the people that they were before 'awakening' to their old selves and the lifetime(s) of memories before them. It's violent, it's rife with mental health struggles and self-realizations and very Teenage in the best way. Gem, the main character, is a mess, and the first person point of view is a lot of self-talk and reasoning through various situations as their life is turned even more upside down than their own actions that affected their life before they got to the whole, 'also I was/am a very powerful god' thing... and met all the people that love/hate them.

I also really loved the whole, "no gods are cis" aspect (after being reincarnated a ton of times-- why would they be!), and the fact that Edgmon didn't straight out say 'so and so is transmasc/transfemme' but there were a lot of hints where if you know you know and if you don't it's not going to detract or distract from the story or characterizations either.

I can't wait to dig my eyes into the sequel to the duology even if I have ~deadlines~ and ~obligations~ first (boo) and skimming the other reviews it's fascinating how a lot of the things I loved (especially Gem being so flawed and so real) were so hated by other people!

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press | Wednesday Books for the eARC in exchange for review!

I loved the story line, my only issue was that I didn't really connect with any of the characters. I loved the story line, I just wanted more emotion.

Title: Godly Heathens
Author: H. E Edgmon
Genre: YA Fantasy
Format: hardback library book
Series: The Ouroboros (#1)
Star Rating: 2 stars

tw: graphic gore and body horror, violence including murder and torture, off-page sexual violence including experiences involving children, abuse including child abuse and off-page domestic abuse, mentions of transphobia and racism including references to slavery and genocide, animal death
*All these trigger warnings are located in the front of the book

A special thank you goes to St. Martin’s Press and Netgalley for providing me with an early copy of this book. Please know that this does not influence my rating or thoughts on the book itself.

No one is more disappointed than me about the low rating I gave this book. This was one of my most anticipated reads since last year. I was immediately hooked by the cover and then I read the synopsis and I was obsessed. But I just could not enjoy this book at all and it’s all because of the main character, Gem.

Gem is so incredibly unlikable. I think they are supposed to be but they went over the line and there were no redeeming factors in their personality. I couldn’t deal with how stuck up and awful Gem was. They were constantly judging everyone and thought they were better than everyone. One instance that sticks out to me is when they were talking about their best friend, Enzo. They said that Enzo acted gayer than he was and said their whole personality was fake. They also said that they hated them for it. It was just too much and made me so mad. Why would you hate your best friend for their personality? What’s the point of even being friends with them? I had a problem with the way Gem treated their mom as well but if I dove into that, we would be here all day. So let’s just say, Gem is pretty unlikable.

While I very much enjoyed the lore, it was so frustrating that it came in bits and pieces. I do understand why it was but there was so much of it, that it needed to be almost info dumped for me to fully understand. I’m unsure if the lore was based on ancient gods, like Greek, or it was something entirely different. I enjoyed the bits I did get but I just wanted more.

I want to put at least one positive thing about this book because I think all books have at least one redeeming quality. I loved all the rep that was in this book. It was filled with lots of LGBT+ rep and that was wonderful to see. I couldn’t even begin to list them because there were so many, which is a good problem to have. There were also POC characters and it was just all organic. It didn’t feel forced or anything.

Overall, I just couldn’t love this book the way I wanted to and I am so disappointed. Gem was a main character I simply couldn’t get behind due to a lot of their actions and their personality. I recently found out that I have the arc for the second book so I might as well continue with the series to see if it gets better. I truly hope it does.

This was a very cool read! I love when fantasies have their own magic systems, and having the story in a realistic setting made it even more intriguing. The inclusion of indigenous identities along with queer identities (and the fact they were included naturally rather than as some kind of showpiece) brought the book to the next level. This is a very strong start to the duology!

Thanks to Netgalley, the publisher, and author for the copy of this eARC for my honest review. All ratings and any reviews are opinions of my own.

This was not the book for me.

I'll be honest, I never finished this book. It's been over a year now, and over 3 tries - 1 reading, 2 audiobook listening - I haven't really been able to get into it. The concept seems cool and I loved the other books I read by this author, but this one is probably going to stay a DNF for me for a long while.

I will hopefully be able to finish it one day!

St. Martin's Press: Minotaur Books, Wednesday Books, St. Martin's Essentials, St. Martin's Griffin, and Castle Point Books are all under boycott.

Free Palestine. Speak up on your racist employee.

I will not be reviewing this title due to the boycott of St. Martins Press and its imprints. More information at @readersforaccountability on Instagram

God from another world? Reincarnation? Evil gods? All can be found in this novel. I just wish the characters had more depth and but-in for me to care about their journey. Overall though, a good read.

I wish I liked this more. For diversity, it gets a 10/10 but that's probably the strongest aspect. The last few pages were intriguing enough that I do want to know what comes next but not enough for me to want to actually continue on with the series.

Godly Heathens follows Gem Echols as they realize they and most of the people they know are reincarnated gods from a different dimension trapped in human bodies and that the sins of their godly past are catching up to them once again. This time Gem and their allies are trying to end the cycle of vengeance and suffering for good. Which is a very interesting concept, but the characters and world-building were too weak to land the execution.

The characters felt more like teens on Netflix than actual teens and, when they are awakened to their powers or when we see flashbacks from the other realm, nothing about their actions or demeanor conveys that they are centuries-old otherworldly beings. I also was not invested in Gem's relationship with Willa Mae at all because all of their chemistry and bonding took place mostly off page and decades before the events of the story. The central conflict is based around a series of betrayals that occurred when they were still gods in their original dimension and is revealed in pieces. However, I still don't understand what exactly happened before, the characters' motivations, or anything about the 1st dimension. As far as I'm concerned, they used to live in an empty void with just them and some caves. I can't imagine any other visuals, inhabitants, or the impact that the gods had on the realm.

As a Percy Jackson fan, I love modern mythological stories and was really hoping for more.
Thank you to NetGalley and Wednesday Books for an early copy for an honest review!

H.E. Edgmon's Godly Heathens is a well-written and exciting tale with reincarnated deities. Although reincarnated gods aren't new, Edgmon crafted a story that felt fresh, unlike anything I've read.
3.5/5

Thank you so, so, so much to NetGalley and Wednesday books for access to an eARC of one of my new favorites in exchange for my honest review!

When Gem Echols wakes up one morning from yet another intensely realistic, horrifying dream in which they see themselves doing horrible things, they're convinced it's just more proof that they're 'not okay' in the head. And despite their struggle to separate the dream from their reality at first, they soldier on with their day, bolstered as always by a text from their long distance best friend and confidante Enzo. But their day only seems to get weirder when new girl Willa Mae--who just so happens to be the 'most breathtaking girl they've ever seen'--shows up at their table at lunch and apologizes for being late. It's just too bad that there's no way she's sane, acting like they've known each other for years and asking Gem where a *knife* is, of all things. Willa Mae gives them the shortest version of events possible, and the story takes a complete turn towards the outrageous. Because suddenly, Gem Echols isn't just Gem Echols anymore. They're *The Magician*, an ancient deity from a different world who has been reincarnated and become the person they are today. And they're...in danger? From other Gods? What!?

This book was an absolute roller coaster ride from start to finish and there wasn't a second that I considered getting off. The characters were fascinating and had me questioning more than once why I loved them so much when they were all *so* morally grey and did some of the questionable things they did. The use of rural Georgia as a setting for this story of an age old battle between Gods was *so* smart, as someone from Georgia. It lends this sort of closed-in feeling to the narrative that you really need when you're playing with concepts like repeated reincarnation and multi-generational family trauma caused by in-fighting between ages-old, all-powerful deities.

The way that H.E. Edgmon weaves such a beautiful, fantastical, *unreal* story by using so many extremely real elements--mental health representation in *multiple* ways, racial diversity, the struggles of indigenous peoples, identity struggles, trans visibility, gender-fluidity, lgbtqia+ representation, trauma, etc.--made for what I'm not shy to say was an absolute *masterpiece* of a contemporary fantasy.

This book was such an easy five star for me, and I've already sunk my teeth deep into the second book and am *so* excited to see where it takes me.

I had extremely high hopes for this book.
I enjoyed the authors other things, but this was very neutral for me.

I felt like the pacing was weird and the characters just didn’t do anything for me. I will try the next one, but I’m not super pumped about it.

Due to the SMP boycott I cannot post a full review of this book. It’s disappointing that the publisher has decided to stay silent and harm their BIPOC authors this way

The premise and execution of this story is incredible. Reincarnated gods as teenagers in small town Georgia is such an incredible plot and the way it played out was so engaging. I did have some issues with the pacing and overall progression, but overall I loved this book and cannot wait for the sequel.

I am a fan of books that give trigger warnings because they allow me to decide whether to read them. H.E. Edgmon included an extensive page of trigger warnings for GODLY HEATHENS, and after discussing the book with a few people who have read it, I went forward with it.

This book is so complex. It took me a few tries to get into it because I was not in a clear enough headspace. It had to be a low-pain day to read because I needed to be able to concentrate on the world-building, characters, and plot.

Once immersed in GODLY HEATHENS, the book moved quickly, leaving me with a cliffhanger ending I did not see coming! It left me wanting book two as fast as I could get my hands on it.

Content Warnings: (per author in the book) This story features a candid depiction of mental illness that, although based on my lived experiences, may make some readers uncomfortable. The main character grapples with managing their symptoms, accepting their own and a family member’s illness, some internalized ableism, and some ableism from others. There are references to self-harm and suicide. Other potentially upsetting content includes graphic gore and body horror; violence, including murder and torture; off-page sexual violence, including experiences that involve children; abuse, including child abuse and off-page domestic violence; mentions of transphobia and racism, including references to slavery and genocide; and animal death.

This was a very interesting and super unique book! It was confusing at times and read kinda like a fever dream, but I loved the queer and trans rep. I feel like I understood only 80% of it, so I’m definitely interested to see where the second book goes.

🌈Queer rep: nonbinary main character (AFAB) who is demi romantic, pansexual, and poly. Main relationships - NB/NB relationship, NB/M (trans guy) relationship, NB/M relationship. Secondary - All the gods are not cis! Trans guy, FF relationship, drag queen.

WOW, this was amazing, mind blowing and perfect. This book starts with a bang and doesn't let you go until the end.
I don't want to say much because this book is so much better if you go in blind and just knowing what is in the blurb and figuring things out at the same time that Gem is figuring them out. There were so many expected twists that kept me engaged and dying to know what was coming next.
I also truly appreciate how unapologetically queer this books is. I can't wait to read the next book (Merciless Saviors).

“None of them know what to think when they look at me. They can’t decide if I’m their god or their monster.”